In today’s world of spiraling energy costs, CIOs are looking to squeeze every kilowatt out of the data center and minimize the power footprint of every desktop PC, creating an almost insurmountable challenge to solution providers and the systems administrators they support.
While energy savings may start with common-sense policies, those policies are often difficult to enforce and measure. Avocent is aiming to bring the “green” monster under control with the latest enhancements to Landesk Management Suite and related hardware.
For the server room, the company has introduced a new line of IP-enabled power strips that give unprecedented control over what devices are powered on or off. For the data center, the company goes one step further with the introduction of intelligent power distribution units (iPDUs) that work closely with DSView 3 Power Manager software. The new iPDUs allow system administrators to meter energy consumption down to the outlet level. That helps to rationalize which components are drawing the most energy and helps administrators to pursue the path of virtualization by using power consumption as a catalyst for consolidation.
Perhaps the biggest “green” news out of Avocent is the introduction of increased power management capabilities to the company’s popular Landesk Management Suite. Users can now define power-related policies and deploy those policies down to desktop PCs. The new policy capabilities are accompanied by “green” reporting tools, which allow admins to analyze and document power use trends and policy impact. Those new capabilities allow admins to instantly determine the ROI of power-saving policies and possibly give companies access to electric company rebates.
Landesk’s new “green” features may make the product a credible competitor to Verdiem’s Surveyor and help to bring green technology to the forefront of facilities management.
Tech Analysis 
